Musical Quark: Audacity

Okay, one of my knee-jerk reactions to a new piece of music is often based on what I am going to classify as "audacity". Point in case, maybe three or four times now, I have been listening to the new Yo La Tengo track, "Pass the Hatchet, I think I'm Goodkind", 11 solid minutes of guitar wonkiness/wonkiness. Thing is, I love Yo La Tengo, and I'm not sure where to file this away. I mean, the album is called I am Not Afraid of you, and I will Beat Your Ass, for starters (I really think the follow up to "I Can Hear the Heart Beating as One" should have been titled "I Can See the Ass Beating in Your Future", but there you go, I'm not in charge of these things).

Anyways, I almost exclusively listen to internet radio at work, and I tend to keep myself busy, and so I find myself thinking in the back of my mind "what is this? I need to find out what this is... it's been going on for an awefully long time", and invariably it is "Pass the Hatchet" playing. 'nuff said, sorry, I totally don't recognize this song as Yo La Tengo. But the song has balls! Maybe that's a better word than audacity anyways. Same goes for that Built to Spill epic of a few months back, "Goin' against you mind"... you're just setting out for a take no prisoners approach when you start out with drums n' guitars like that.

Also noted... after the infinite coolness of "Crazy", which I mostly hear in shopping centers and emanating from Jeep YJs these days (oh well), Gnarls Barkley's cover of "Gone Daddy Gone" - sounds so much like the original I find myself thinking it is the original if I'm not paying attention. That's gotta count for audacity, because it was a kickass song in the first place, and the cover is, well, it has a level of subtletyin there somewhere. umm, elsewhere, then.